


I miss him

by Avrina



Series: Friendship & Love [4]
Category: StarCraft (Video Games)
Genre: M/M, Melancholy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-11-15 05:07:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20860730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Avrina/pseuds/Avrina





	I miss him

The statue garden of Augustgrad, placed at the foot of the palace, was a peaceful place. Except today. Today Emperor Valerian unveiled a new statue in memory of the rebellion against his father and the park was full of people celebrating the spring festival at the same time.

A lonely petal from one of the flowering cherry trees landed in the champagne glass Admiral Matthew D. Horner held in his gloved hand, but he didn't notice. Besides, the champagne had already stopped bubbling, but he hadn't tasted more than a tiny sip. He was far too busy staring lost in thoughts at the statue, which stood on a small pedestal and whose polished surface shone in the sun.

A Marine. Of course, a Marine stood in the middle of the group of figures. But probably one had to be blind to overlook that it wasn't an all-world Marine, but Jim Raynor. Of course, the white skeleton emblem on the anthracite shoulder piece and the characteristic skull on the visor were only hinted at, but nevertheless... The pose, how he held the weapon... it was Jim, undoubtedly.

To the left of the Marine stood a female ghost. The figure was dipped in a blue shimmer of color, so that the hair color of the long braid was not recognizable, but the admiral knew all too well that the emperor would rather set a monument to Sarah Kerrigan - despite her existence as Queen of Blades - than Nova. What a bitch.

At the left edge stood a Medic with a closed visor, but the size of the figure indicated a woman and any Raider would recognize that the identification of the Medic was that of a Raider. The identification of Lieutenant Morales, who had saved the ass of so many of them more than once and had been ennobled for fun after a particularly daring action by Jim.

On the right was a male figure whose outfit was so general that it could have been the driver of any vehicle, from a SCV to a siege tank. His identification was illegible thanks to a well-placed oil stain on the uniform.

However, the figure that stood between that driver and the Marine made the admiral shudder. It was a pilot, his upper body demonstratively facing the Marine, a hand on the pistol in the hip holster, as if he wanted to protect the Marine. And the ID... well, the ID was his own that he- Matt Horner- had received when he joined the Confederate Army to become a pilot. Fully aware that he would desert immediately after training and defect to the Sons of Korhal. He had come a long way since then...

"If you stand here any longer, people will start to think you're a statue too." 

Matt laboriously tore his gaze from the statue and let it swing to Valerian, who suddenly stood next to him and put on a mocking smile.

"... memories...", was the only thing Matt got out in response and Valerian's smile gave way to a worried expression.

"First, we go to my office. Second, you need something stronger than champagne."

~

Valerian had chosen his private office well, it offered a magnificent view over the same park where they had stood recently. But now Matt was already holding the second glass of whiskey, although it wasn't even eleven o'clock in the morning, and looked down at the spring-like green.

"I miss him."

"I know," Valerian said gently.

"You... know?" Irritated, Matt looked up. Valerian nodded seriously.

"When he disappeared, you had quite a crash. You told me everything. Or at least I suppose so, your vocabulary wasn't the best after all the stuff you dumped into you."

Matt felt not only his cheeks but also his ears, his neck, even his chest burning with shame.

"The only thing I couldn't extract from your story was: did he know?"

"Yes..." Matt murmured and emptied the whiskey in one go. It wasn't really his way of drowning his feelings like that, but those little details on that statue had hit him hard.

~

Matt sighed. Well, at least it was _meant_ to be a sigh, the result was more of a disgruntled growl. Raynor was the last one in the Hyperion bar, even Cooper had disappeared for a long time. He had buried his head in the crook of his arm, one hand holding the empty bottle, the other an empty glass; at least he still had the decency to drink from a glass...

"Commander..."

Raynor didn't move.

"Commander, sir, you should go to bed." Matt tried to keep a polite tone, but his patience for Raynor's drinking was strained to the point of breaking. He shook Raynor's shoulder.

"Sir..."

Raynor made some strange-gurgling sounds and raised his head, his eyes only minimally open.

"Hmm?"

"Commander, you should go to bed..."

"Hmm." Raynor nodded and knocked over the bottle Matt caught before it could roll off the table. The glass wasn't so lucky, because Raynor swept it to the ground in a bumpy motion, where it shattered. "Oh."

Matt took a deep breath and this time his sigh was really a sigh. Resigned, but a sigh.

"Come on, Commander, I'll help you." He grabbed Raynor's upper arm and he allowed himself to be pulled wobbly to his feet.

"Thank you, Matt. You're a good boy," Raynor mumbled and Matt grimaced. He hadn't been a boy for a long time.

"I know, sir. You tell me often enough." Pretty much every time Matt had to drag his commander back to bed to be exact.

"Really?"

"Hmm-hmm."

The Commander leaned heavily on him and together they swayed slowly through the sleeping Hyperion to Raynor's quarters. In his bedroom, Matt let him sink to the bed and groaned in relief. The man was damn heavy.

Raynor mumbled something that could have been a _thank you_, but more than the words the haze of alcohol hit him in the face.

"Sir, can you at least get your boots off?"

The confused expression on Raynor's face said it all and so Matt kneeled down to pull the dirty boots off his feet. The socks underneath had once been white, both had a hole on the big toe. When he rose up again, he sighed resignedly; Raynor had slumped down and looked as if he would tip over at any moment, in order to sleep off snoringly his intoxication. And since there was worry among all the frustration and resignation, Matt also took the Commander's gun belt, saved his cigarette box, and then fished out of his trouser pockets all sorts of small stuff that would either disturb or be crushed when he slept.

"While you're at it, will you continue?"

Matt flinched and met Raynor's sleepy look under heavy eyelids.

"Excuse me?"

"You're just undressing me, aren't you?"

"You're drunk, sir."

"I know." Raynor grinned crooked and Matt turned his eyes away to put a lighter and a crumpled pack of cigarettes on the bedside table.

"You should go to sleep, sir. We need to talk about food rations tomorrow."

"Be a good boy and take care of it."

"I do already, sir." Anger and the familiar frustration arose in Matt. "But if you would drink less and spend more time on the bridge, you would also know that I can't go on without more money. I can't cut the credits out of my ribs."

"Ouch," Raynor murmured as the words reached him. Matt regretted his harsh tone a little, just a little, when Raynor looked up at him, but the Commander missed so much that he couldn't keep his mouth shut much longer.

"You should sleep."

"Hmm... in clothes?"

"Take your clothes off."

"Was that an order?" Raynor grinned crooked again and Matt rolled his eyes.

"No, a well-intentioned advice." As if he would give Raynor orders...

"Uff...," Raynor then made while trying to remove his arms from his shirt and Matt sighed again before he grabbed it and pulled the shirt - which had been white like the socks once - over Raynor's head and simply dropped it for lack of a better place. He was captain and second-in-command, not a chambermaid or body servant.

But then his eyes glided over Raynor's naked skin and he swallowed dry. Despite all the alcohol and unhealthy stuff the commander stuffed into himself, his abdomen was flat, all the muscles of his upper body well defined. Matt suppressed the urge to stroke a few scars and couldn't stop himself from blushing when he noticed Raynor's gaze, which suddenly turned miserable.

"Be so good and help me with this thing here..." He pointed down and Matt wanted to open his mouth to protest, but Raynor's trembling fingers tapped a little higher than expected on the belt buckle. Matt pressed his lips together so he couldn't say anything wrong - or even stupid and embarrassing - and opened the heavy belt buckle before he helped Raynor get on his feet enough to pull his pants off his butt.

"You're a good boy, you know?" he mumbled again and almost tipped over trying to push the pants off his feet.

"Yes, sir, I know." Matt sighed and threw the pants aside.

"Would you rather be a bad boy?"

"Depending on the point of view, we _are_ the bad boys, sir," he replied and gave Raynor a meaningful look. There the Commander sat in front of him only in underpants (and dirty socks), not half as drunk as he thought, and had ambiguous conversations. _Great._ But Raynor grinned crooked again.

"And what do you like better?"

Matt blinked uneasily. "Excuse me?"

"Would you rather be a good boy or a bad boy?"

Matt swallowed hard; in his uniform, which he was still wearing despite the late hour, he suddenly became uncomfortably warm.

"The question is a little inappropriate, don't you- phew!"

Raynor had swayed on his feet and was now leaning heavily on Matt.

"To me you're a good boy and good boys deserve a bonus now and then."

"Phew!" Matt made again and had to take a step back because Raynor was standing anything but safe. "And where are you going to get the money for such a bonus if you can't even pay us our regular salary?" he asked a little strained under the bulky weight. He promptly got a slap on the butt for his answer, which could be considered cheeky, and he jerked under it, but Raynor smiled cunningly.

"Who's talking about credits?"

Matt didn't get a chance to answer because he was kissed. And when that information actually got into his brain, his knees went soft and he feared they'd both go down, but somehow they held each other up. He tasted the alcohol and felt the stubble on Raynor's chin, wanted to sink into the kiss, but gently pushed him away.

"Isn't that what you want?" Raynor wanted to know and now held on to Matt's hips.

"No, sir," Matt said quietly and Raynor raised a brow.

"No kisses? Not a bit of fun? I mean it, you deserve it."

"You're drunk, sir."

"Is it so bad?"

"You can't think clearly anymore. "

"Don't you want to be kissed? Or fucked?"

Matt turned bright red and became hot and cold at the same time.

Did he want to? God damn it, yes!

Was it a good idea? Hell, no!

No matter what decision he made now, he would regret it afterwards.

"You can also suck my dick if you like it better..."

Matt took a deep breath with his eyes closed. Normally he would only dream of such moments... He pushed Raynor back to the bed until he dropped on it, then he stepped back and took a stance.

"Good night, sir."

Astonished, Raynor looked at him. "Not...?"

"No, sir. You'd regret it."

"I doubt I can remember it tomorrow."

Matt smiled half-heartedly. "You're not that drunk. But you are drunk enough to not get it up."

Raynor's face told him the remark hit, so he nodded to the commander and left.

Sex when drunk was never a good idea. If you added a superior to it - who was soberly absolutely straight - and put feelings on top of it, it ended up being a very unhealthy mixture. Yes, he would regret _not_ having done it, but the shards of his broken heart after a one-night stand that embarrassed Raynor afterwards would hurt more than his regret.

"Sometimes I wish I wasn't such a good boy..."

~

"This actually makes more sense than your first version of the story," Valerian remarked dryly.

"Thank you..." Matt murmured no less dryly. Valerian put a hand on his shoulder.

"I miss him too."

Astonished, Matt looked up at him. "Really?"

"He always had good advice for me. He had something fatherly, you know..."

"Hmm...", Matt made indefinite, "for many of the younger Raiders, he was like a big brother." He saw Valerian smiling and then the emperor put his arm around his shoulders; a brotherly gesture.

"You know, the adjutant of minister Epps..." Valerian didn't finish the sentence, obviously he didn't find the right words.

"He's a cute guy," Matt said to bail him out.

"Yes," Valerian said and then laughed quietly. "Not that I would think him cute, my goodness, but... you know what I mean."

Matt smiled and nodded. For a moment they stood there in silence, then Matt wanted to know: "How did you even get the idea for this statue?

"Oh, I had the idea for a long time. Well, sort of." Valerian finally let him go and took some sketches from a file on the desk behind them. One of them had some other figures carved out of a wall with a battlecruiser engraved on it.

"I wanted to put you there somehow, you know..." Valerian seemed embarrassed. "Despite everything... we are friends, aren't we?"

"Despite everything?" Matt asked uncertainly.

"Well, one of our encounters ended with you smearing dirt in my face."

"And afterwards you saved my life."

"You see? We became friends."

Matt's answer was a sceptical frown.

"Anyway... when Jim disappeared and you told me all this, I searched for your old files. And when I found this, I couldn't help myself."

He held something up that Matt recognized after a moment as a photo of himself and his comrades during training. There were five of them, posing excessively for the camera; Matt had put a hand on the shoulder of the young man in the middle. They had been something like a couple for a while and Valerian had replaced this comrade for his statue by Jim Raynor. Matt averted his gaze.

"It was really in my file?"

"Yes. Well, in the closure, but it was in."

"Great. More memories," Matt murmured dryly.

Valerian remained silent for a moment, then sighed. "Let's have lunch..."

"For all I care..."

But they didn't move.

"I miss him," Matt finally said quietly and looked out at the park again.

"I know," Valerian said quietly. "But I am there for you. You can talk to me."

"I know. Thank you."

When they left the room, they were again Emperor and Admiral, calm, professional and seriously looking forward to the next challenge.


End file.
